


The Nomuer lies

by Imperias



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-06-14
Updated: 2018-06-15
Packaged: 2019-05-23 06:38:16
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,882
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14929115
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Imperias/pseuds/Imperias
Summary: Magic finds a way.





	1. Interrogation

“Harry, I’m detective Schultz. Do you know why you’re here today, son?” The detective gestured towards the unkempt boy, dressed in a loose blue shirt adorning several holes and baggy jeans, his shaggy hair covering his forehead. The boy looked as if he hadn’t bathed in at least a week and the odor all but confirmed it. “Do you have any idea why I brought you in today,” the detective asked again.

Harry slouched in his chair across from his interrogator, his arms folded at his chest. He stared blankly towards the middle of the table between them. “Is that you’re question? Are you asking if I know why I’m here?”

“Yes, Harry I’m curious if you know why you’re sitting in this room, talking with me.” The detective lifted a cup of coffee to his mouth and sipped, then sat it back down and gestured towards a second cup that he slid in front of the boy. Harry continued to stare blankly and the detective concluded the boy would not talk. “Harry, do you remember the night of the fifth? What you were doing?”

Harry grabbed the coffee that was offered to him, but instead of drinking from it, he pushed it back towards the detective. “I never cared much for liquid.” He leaned back, folding his arms at his chest once again. “I like…...” He gazed deeply into the detective’s eyes. “I don’t remember the fifth. That was nine nights ago. I’ve done a lot since then.”

“Have you? What do kids your age do around here?”

Harry shrugged, “I don’t do what kids around here do and you know that.” The boy closed his eyes, tilting his head back.

“I guess you’re right. What does Dudley like to do?”

The boy scratched at the dried blood under his chin. “Dudley,” he said, submissively.

“That’s right. Your cousin, Dudley Dursley. Where is he?” The detective leaned forward, resting his weight on the table, his elbows pointed outward. Across from him, Harry seemed lost in a daydream as seconds passed by, and with every one of those seconds, the tick of the clock kept them rooted in this otherwise silent room, pausing the world around them.

“Do you know where Dudley is, Harry?”

Harry, now looking towards the fluorescent light above, took a deep sigh. “Dudley’s disappeared, Jim.”

The detective looked bothered by the boy’s assertion, leaning back in his chair as it squeaked loudly, breaking the tedium of the clock ticks for only a moment. “Why did you call me Jim,” he asked, bluntly.

“Why does anyone call anyone anything? It’s your name, is it not?”

“You may call me detective Schultz, Mr. Schultz, or simply James. Do not call me Jim.” James pondered for a moment, gazing into Harry’s inattentive green eyes. “How did you even know my name was James?”

The boy continued to stare above, as if looking past the light in the center of the ceiling and into some dark void beyond. There were several moths in the casing surrounding the bulbs, having died while trapped inside. 

“What is life, Jim?”

James was confused at the question. “Excuse me?”

“I asked a question, Jim. What is life? What is it to you?”

Baffled, James answered the question as best he could, “Well, to me, it was my family. My wife and children.”

“Yes, a nice house, an expensive car, a swimming pool, food in the fridge, heat in the winter. A good job, one that provides for that family you have. 

Watching the games on Sunday?”

“Where’s the point in this?”

“The point is that there are two types of people in the world, Jim. The ones that see a certain reality in which trivialities and luxuries are of any worth, and the ones too smart for their own good. The ones that know we’re all clinging to something that might kill us.” Harry continued staring towards the fluorescent light and lifeless moths.

James looked up towards the light, noticing the flickering nuisance it was, and then back towards the boy.

“Son, I am trying my hardest to stay calm with you. I’ll forget that you suggested my wife and children were trivial things, but you had better stop calling me Jim. The only people who called me Jim were my mother and-”

“Your wife. Yes, Jim.”

James, his face red with anger, slammed his hand down upon the table as the boy let out a subtle grin. The detective breathed in and out a couple of times and apologized to the boy for his outburst. “…But, look, Harry. I don’t find it amusing or impressive that you’ve managed to hack into my home security system.”

The boy laughed, “You have no idea what i’m cable of. I would not waste time spying on you.”

“Okay,” the detective shrugged, “You got me. Let’s push all this to the side, son. You said your cousin Dudley-”

“He was not my cousin.”

James smiled, poking his finger in the boy’s direction. “Funny. You spoke of him in the past tense.”

Harry, amused, had smiled back, eliciting whatever remained of the youth left inside him. “He’s not here, is he?”

The detective wore his smile as long as he could, then sighed.”Where the hell is he Harry?”

The boy looked back up at the light. He seemed to be in his own world, toying with the detective, wasting his time. “You seem stressed. Why don’t you have a cigarette?”

James scoffed at the boy. “I don’t smoke, but thank you. Explain, in detail, what you were doing on the night of the fifth, Harry.”

“I’ll tell you everything, Jim. It won’t help you, but if you insist to know the things i know. Things will never be the same for you”

“Please.”

“I was down at the playground, when Dudley turned up with some hipster wannabe friends.”

“Sure. Continue.”

“He mentioned a names i hold dear to me. They were calling me freak and something snapped behind them ”

“You mean across from the park?”

“What do you think?”

Harry was finally talking and the detective expressed relief, it was silent for a moment. Something snapped, making his ears ring. it came from within the wall behind him.

“Did you hear that” James pondered for a moment, gazing into the boys green eyes. They were suddenly bored into his own. Making him feel uneasy.


	2. Chapter 2

"Survival of the fittest."

"Why would you say that?"

"I don't think you want to know what's behind that glass window"

"Yes i do! What hell is your problem kid."

Harry laughed. "You want so much don't you. I went to check it out the disturbance. I'm a curious boy and his friends ran off when yellow eyes blinked from within the trees. Poor old Dudley came with me in the end. Scared out of his wits. I argued with Dudley, because I didn't think it was a good idea. He came with me anyways."

James gestured towards the boy, "And that was the last time you had seen him?"

"You know I can leave any time I want, right? You have nothing incriminating against me, Jim."

James smiled, "There are two reasons why you're here and one reason why I don't have you cuffed."

"Is that right?"

"Yeah, 'fraid so, son. One, I have witnesses who saw you and Dudley running, and then you alone running back to your house, between two or three in the morning. They said it looked like you were running after someone.

"Wild inaccuracies, Jim."

"Two, you left these outside your house."

Harry was tapping his fingers upon the table.

"Not mine."

"Sadly, Dudley's not here to verify that. Son, you were the last person seen with him and then you ran and abandoned him. Officers found an unregistered silver handgun and this engraved stick. The only reason you're not in cuffs right now is because I wanted you to feel comfortable. Safe."

"Like I said, those are wild inaccuracies and you can throw your theories over the fence, just like your cigarette butts."

The detective was fuming as he slammed his hand onto the table once again. "You said you weren't spying on me, you little prick!"

"I wasn't." The boy was rotating his chair left and right, the chair squeaking with every swivel. He leveraged his right foot on the heel of his left, then his left to his right, removing his shoes and scooting them neatly side by side. He then leaned back, lifting his legs upon the table and crossing them.

"What your life is to you, Jim?"

James grunted, eyeing the boy's socks and their holes.

"My life."

"The one where you're helplessly clinging to something that will inevitably kill you, yes?"

The detective removed a pack of Marlboro Reds from his breast pocket, hidden behind his trench coat. He pulled a lighter from his pants and lit a cigarette. He couldn't take his eyes off the boy's feet, feeling repulsed as a big toe wriggled out of a hole.

"Are you threatening me, boy?"

"That would mean that I care, Jim." Even though his big toe was free, he continued wiggling it.

"That I care about your existence in this world."

James ashed his cigarette in the middle of the table. "That doesn't bother me, Harry. What bothers me is your constant diversion. Answer my questions."

"You're just a speck, Jim. An insignificant grain of sand being swallowed by the tide. You're a blemish, really. A hiccup. Nothing more. Do you believe in God?"

"My religious preference must be insignificant, as well. Wouldn't it, Harry?"

"He's abandoned you."

"And you have a personal relationship?"

"A relationship. I don't call him God."

"Let me guess, a kid like you? Atheist?"

"That's just one less god than you, but no."

James ashed his cigarette once more unto the middle of the table, using his pack to neatly gather the ashes into one small mound.

"That's fantastic, son. I've got all day."

"You have no idea how long you've got, Jim."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"Does anyone, really? Besides someone like Dudley?"

"Like Dudley."

"You see, Jim. We're all slaves."

"Enlighten me." He ashed his cigarette once more.

"I think I've been clear enough. However, isn't it time for us to be free?"

"Free from what, Harry?"

"Ourselves."

The detective put his cigarette out in the cup of coffee that he offered the boy, maintaining the ash mound he accrued in the middle.

"I've had enough of your games, son."

Harry peered in the corner behind James, towards the camera. Then towards the window.

"Do you know who is watching us?"

"Yes, I do."

"I don't think you do, Jim."

The detective quickly slid his chair back and stood up.

"While I go grab some lunch, I'll let you think about how you want this to continue. Think long and hard, Harry. I don't want you to rot in here forever."

Harry watched the detective walk towards the door. "You'll never find the bodies."

James slowly turned around and saw the boy staring deeply into the light again. "Bodies? As in more than one?"

"I'd like to show you something," the boy said, as he looked down towards the ash mound, it started to vibrate.


End file.
